lives through us. There is something in us that is not us or ours alone , she would sometimes try to tell them, but it is what makes us who we are . That was the wisdom they needed to learn.
But they never listened, or thought she was just drunk and out of it, but she wasnât the one drunk or out of it; they were. Thatâs why they were beside themselves, unable to understand what was happening, the way they were now.
Craig was distraught, spastic. He hadnât really been that close to Baz, but something was going off in him that she couldnât even guess at.
âItâs okay to cry, honey,â Smurf reassured in the soothing voice she found for her sons when they needed comforting. âHoney, come here.â
She knew he was scared, because death is frightening if all you can think of is yourself, and sadly that was all Craig was able to do at his present level of spiritual development. True, heâd asked about Cath, but Smurf knew he was thinking about himself as he wept, about his own death that would inevitably come, swift and black, just as it comes to all of us, and that filled him with nothing but horror.
âCome here, honey,â Smurf repeated, trying to calm him down.
But Craig didnât want to go to her. Craig didnât want to be comforted. âFucking dogs!â he yelled impotently at the phantom police he felt closing in on his and all their lives. Why couldnât they just leave them all alone? The terrible police murderers waiting in the shadows for them all. He wanted to punch something hard, hurt it, tear the world apart and then do it all over again till the fuckers were dead. But the fuckers would never die; theyâd always be there, waiting, because thatâs the world as it is.
âYouâve got to think positive,â she soothed, âpositive. Thatâs what Baz would have wanted, because everyoneâs got to move on.â
But Craig didnât feel positive. Not one part of him.
He was acting like the kid he was, filled with grief and fury at the pain he didnât comprehend. Screaming, spluttering, stumbling out across the hall into the backyard, past the cowering, whimpering dog, with Smurf after him, trying to calm him. Grabbing at the clothes rack, he threw it uselessly against the tree, chucking clothes everywhere.
Smurf knew her son, and knew how to handle him. âCome on, baby, calm down, come here.â
J had never seen anything like it, not grief like this, and didnât even understand it, any of it. Not the news of Bazâs death, not his own feelings of emptiness and numbness, the same numbness heâd felt at his motherâs death. He wasnât even sure if he really cared about anyone, he just felt so dead inside. Maybe he didnât. Or maybe the pain was something he had to lock away and forget for a while before it blew him apart the same way it was blowing Craig apart.
Was this it? Was this what life meant? His life, their lives? Something you could laugh about as you ground it beneath your shoe? Was all the rest of itâall the talk about values and happinessâjust a lie to cover up the fact that the coppers could just walk up and shoot anyone they wanted through the head because no-one was going to stop them, because they had a uniform and a badge and that gave them the right to do whatever they wanted? And then lie about it, and say he had a gun and the shot was in self-defence?
Was this the truth? That no-oneâs ever really safe, that all you can ever hope to be is so insignificant that it never occurs to anyone to actually kill you? Was that what it was like to live in this place?
If Craig was showing it, J was turning it inside, where it could do even more damage. He didnât know why it had happened or why it was happening to them, but he knew it wasnât right.
Pope was different: quiet, still, deathly. Carefully pouring himself a glass of water, he stared straight ahead
Marguerite Henry, Bonnie Shields